I would be interested in developing a new mailing list for the National
Writing Project.  The National Writing Project is a collaborative
university/school staff development program to improve the teaching and
learning of writing in the nation's classrooms. It is a university-based
teacher-centered program. The Project had its start in 1973 at the
University of California at Berkeley. Presently there are 161 sites in the
U.S. and 5 sites outside in Canada and Europe.
 
Each year at all NWP sites successful teachers of writing from all levels
of instruction, elementary school through university, are identified and
invited to participate in intensive five-week Summer Institutes. After the
Institute these teachers join with other NWP Teacher Consultants who have
participated in previous institutes to plan and conduct year-long staff
development workshops on the teaching of writing in project-sponsored
programs in schools.
 
We are looking to offer opportunities for NWP teachers to hook into the
internet.  Some teachers and directors already have access through
affiliated universities or schools.  We are looking for options to connect
many more of our teachers.  We are most interested in fostering
communication via Internet technology and would like to develop a range of
discussion forums.  I think that a mailing list would greatly enhance our
ability to network people through the Internet and begin discussions on how
and why such forums could be developed to suit the needs of the users.
 
We have seen such technologies have a great influence within and between
NWP sites across the country.  Many teachers have already gained access to
email accounts, bulletin boards and newsgroups.  We would like to broaden
the base of teachers who have such resources available to them as well as
create a center to which they can share discussion among themselves.
 
The NWP has been developing  cross-site networks through the years - there
has been urban and rural sites networks - and now a new "Project Outreach"
is being developed.  This Project Outreach is aimed specifically at
improving writing instruction in schools with large numbers of students
from low-income backgrounds.  It is this outreach project in particular
that could greatly benefit from a mailing list that its teachers can freely
subscribe to and begin discussions across state boundaries about the
development of this project, the use of new communications technologies to
facilitate its development, and beyond.
 
Presently I am maintaining the homepage of the National Writing Project
(http://www-gse.berkeley.edu/Research/NWP/nwp.html).  I would interested in
being the moderator of a maillist.  After reading several documents that I
found on the web, including Diane Kovacs, et al., "How to Start and Manage
a Listserve group", I realize that there is time involved in the upkeep of
a list, as well as several decisions to be made upon starting one.  I still
need to discuss further with a colleague about the possibilities of an
open/closed list  - but I do know that I'd like a "publicly" distributed
list that would be moderated as my colleague and I see fit.
 
I have seen that there are many mailing lists for educators, and I  have
been encouraging members of the Writing Project to subscribe to those which
they might be interested.  However, in addition, I feel that the NWP is
already a strong network(s) of people whom I think would benefit from a
centralized mailing list to focus on specific concerns.
 
The name I was thinking about was NWP-L.  I don't think that has a
duplicate - or at least I haven't found one.
 
Please let me know if you would be interested in sponsoring such a list.
Feel free to email me directly with questions, suggestions, problems or
concerns.  Thank you.
 
Christina Cantrill
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